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Tuesday, 26 August 2008

No2ID!

The latest Government data loss has, it seems to me, been pretty downplayed in the media - largely because Parliament isn't sitting, but also, it seems to me, because we have just got used to it, blase about the personal details of tens of thousands of peope being...well, lost, like you lose your keys.

In fact, of course, it's wholly unacceptable. But what it also underlines, surely, is that the ID card scheme is a really, really badidea. Putting aside the significant and substantive points of principle (which I consider overwhelming) for a moment, consider and meditate on the simple fact that no computer system is wholly secure and hack-proof. If a human has designed it, a human can hack it. Therefore, logic dictates that the National Identity Register will be compromised, probably quite soon after going live, even if there isn't a data loss due to the Government's own incompetence. As such, it seems to me, the entire latest justification of the legislation - providing secure and guaranteed proof of identity for all citizens - is holed beneath the waterline. The hacking - which as I say, will inevitably happen - will be disastrous and a massive pain in the arse for those directly affected, impacting on all parts of their lives; and it could also, depending on who the hackers are, have significant wider security implications.

And it's all due to start very shortly. The first cards, it is claimed, will be issued this year or next.